No God in The Machine

And many more people suffering dementia never have moments of clarity. Rare cases of terminal lucidity indicates you likely haven't experienced dementia firsthand. Having experienced Alzheimer's destruction on a family members mind I am absolutely confident that memories are completely lost.

I think you're really only talking about recall here.

I mentioned recently on here Li-Huei Tsai's 2007 paper "Recovery of learning and memory is associated with chromatin remodelling". Tsai used CK-p25 mice models where expression of p25 - a protein implicated in various neurodegenerative diseases including Alzheimer's - can be turned on and off with a special diet.

Uninduced CK-p25 mice and control mice were trained in a fear-conditioning paradigm and returned to their home cages for four weeks, followed by six weeks of p25 induction. Next, the mice were either subjected to a regime of Environmental Enrichment or kept in their home cages for an additional four weeks.

Afterwards, all mice were subjected to the memory test. Whereas non-enriched CK-p25 mice showed significantly impaired freezing behaviour, indicating the loss of long-term memories, enriched CK-p25 mice displayed much improved freezing behaviour, indicating a marked recovery of long-term memories. Importantly, enriched and non-enriched CK-p25 mice have a similar extent of neuronal loss and brain atrophy . Evidence for the recovery of long-term memories was also found by using the water maze paradigm.

The fact that long-term memories can be recovered by EE supports the idea that the apparent ‘memory loss’ is really a reflection of inaccessible memories. These findings are in line with the phenomenon known as ‘fluctuating memories’ in which demented patients experience temporary time periods of apparent clarity.
 
I was thinking that much of parapsychology depends upon memory loss through overwriting by feedback. For example, Eban Alexander's 'memory' of seeing his unknown sister is overwritten by the photographic image he sees later of her. Most (all?) of the "remarkably accurate" events only occur under conditions of feedback.

This would be testable, I suspect. Comparisons could be made between brain activations when exposed to original vs. overwritten memories.

Linda

If I understand where you're coming from, you'd just have to make sure your tests can distinguish between a repressed memory that was triggered (which is another interpretation of Eban's experience) , vs. overwritten.

I think the deeper insight that psi seems to be suggesting is that memory may not be personal, as our ego driven personalities may just be fooling us into thinking that it is. That sort of goes beyond what we have even talked about in this thread so far.
 
If I understand where you're coming from, you'd just have to make sure your tests can distinguish between a repressed memory that was triggered (which is another interpretation of Eban's experience) , vs. overwritten.

Right, so a reaction which is triggered by the overwritten 'picture', but not by the original image, suggests that the original image has been lost.

I think the deeper insight that psi seems to be suggesting is that memory may not be personal, as our ego driven personalities may just be fooling us into thinking that it is. That sort of goes beyond what we have even talked about in this thread so far.

Well, that sounds suspiciously like you are talking about what undocumented stories tell us about psi. And realistically, undocumented stories tell us a lot about human cognitive biases and memory, and not so much about some sort of psi-like characteristic to the universe.

Linda
 
Right, so a reaction which is triggered by the overwritten 'picture', but not by the original image, suggests that the original image has been lost.

No, that's not what I was impying at all.

Well, that sounds suspiciously like you are talking about what undocumented stories tell us about psi. And realistically, undocumented stories tell us a lot about human cognitive biases and memory, and not so much about some sort of psi-like characteristic to the universe.

Linda

Ditto to what I said above ... not what I was impying at all.
 
I think you're really only talking about recall here.

I mentioned recently on here Li-Huei Tsai's 2007 paper "Recovery of learning and memory is associated with chromatin remodelling". Tsai used CK-p25 mice models where expression of p25 - a protein implicated in various neurodegenerative diseases including Alzheimer's - can be turned on and off with a special diet.

Uninduced CK-p25 mice and control mice were trained in a fear-conditioning paradigm and returned to their home cages for four weeks, followed by six weeks of p25 induction. Next, the mice were either subjected to a regime of Environmental Enrichment or kept in their home cages for an additional four weeks.

Afterwards, all mice were subjected to the memory test. Whereas non-enriched CK-p25 mice showed significantly impaired freezing behaviour, indicating the loss of long-term memories, enriched CK-p25 mice displayed much improved freezing behaviour, indicating a marked recovery of long-term memories. Importantly, enriched and non-enriched CK-p25 mice have a similar extent of neuronal loss and brain atrophy . Evidence for the recovery of long-term memories was also found by using the water maze paradigm.

The fact that long-term memories can be recovered by EE supports the idea that the apparent ‘memory loss’ is really a reflection of inaccessible memories. These findings are in line with the phenomenon known as ‘fluctuating memories’ in which demented patients experience temporary time periods of apparent clarity.
http://www.nature.com/nmeth/journal/vaop/ncurrent/full/nmeth.2935.html
 
And realistically, undocumented stories tell us a lot about human cognitive biases and memory, and not so much about some sort of psi-like characteristic to the universe.

On the one hand, you seem to be suggesting that undocumented stories are too unreliable to tell us much about psi, yet on the other hand you seem to be suggesting that we are ok to depend upon unreliable stories as a source of information about cognitive bias and memory. Interesting.
 
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On the one hand, you seem to be suggesting that undocumented stories are too unreliable to tell us much about psi, yet on the other hand you seem to be suggesting that we are ok to depend upon unreliable stories as a source of information about cognitive bias and memory. Interesting.
Well, no. I didn't make that suggestion (and I wouldn't, either).

I don't know what's going on. First I suggest an experiment and EthanT gets pissy about it because he decides I was implying it was his idea (???). And now you've decided to attribute something you made up to me. It's like I'm not meant to have my own ideas, or something.

Maybe Ethan's advice is sound and we should quit while we're behind. :)

Linda
 
Well, no. I didn't make that suggestion (and I wouldn't, either).

I don't know what's going on. First I suggest an experiment and EthanT gets pissy about it because he decides I was implying it was his idea (???). And now you've decided to attribute something you made up to me. It's like I'm not meant to have my own ideas, or something.

Maybe Ethan's advice is sound and we should quit while we're behind. :)

Linda

It might help for you to quit torturing language.
 
I didn't make that suggestion

So when you said "undocumented stories tell us a lot about human cognitive biases and memory", you in fact meant "undocumented stories cannot tell us a lot about human cognitive biases and memory"? Mmmmmm.....

And now you've decided to attribute something you made up to me.

It was a comment about the meaning of something that you have said. I find it bizarre that you have chosen to label that comment as "something I have made up". Are we to suppose that anyone who contends the meaning of what you say is guilty of fabrication?
 
So when you said "undocumented stories tell us a lot about human cognitive biases and memory", you in fact meant "undocumented stories cannot tell us a lot about human cognitive biases and memory"? Mmmmmm.....

Ah, now I see what you were doing. Sorry, that was my fault. I should have asked where you got the idea from, instead of going with "huh? wtf?" The weirdness from EthanT threw me off.

We know about the details of various cognitive biases and how memory works, from empirical studies. "Undocumented stories" are formed under conditions which include the effect of those biases and memory. So it's not so much that we can figure out what kinds of cognitive biases are present or how memory works, from undocumented stories. But rather that undocumented stories tell us a lot about what kinds of stories will be produced from human cognitive biases and memory.

It was a comment about the meaning of something that you have said. I find it bizarre that you have chosen to label that comment as "something I have made up". Are we to suppose that anyone who contends the meaning of what you say is guilty of fabrication?

No, you're just supposed to ask for clarification, like I should have done. On the other hand, an apparent contradiction is a good clue that some explaining is needed.

Linda
 
The trait of the troll is a unique and insatiable desire to annoy people, really to be a nuisance. It's what I would refer to as a mild form of schadenfreude. In many ways it is a regression to the adolescent self. A good troll is capable of striking the right balance (e.g. harmony-disharmony, accomodation-alienation, vague-forthcoming) as not to be too obvious and (a) not being 'found out' & thus alienated, and paradoxically (b) enhancing the annoyance factor. Anyway, it's interesting stuff. A fascinating case study exists right here on this very forum.
 
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The trait of the troll is a unique and insatiable desire to annoy people, really to be a nuisance. It's what I would refer to as a mild form a schadenfreud. In many ways it is a regression to the adolescent self. A good troll is capable of striking the right balance (i.e. harmony-disharmony, accomodation-alienation, vague-forthcoming) as not to be too obvious and (a) not being 'found out' & thus alienated, and paradoxically (b) enhancing the annoyance factor. Anyway, it's interesting stuff. A fascinating case study exists right here on this very forum.
Then we should all take lessons from you.;)
 
The trait of the troll is a unique and insatiable desire to annoy people, really to be a nuisance. It's what I would refer to as a mild form a schadenfreude. In many ways it is a regression to the adolescent self. A good troll is capable of striking the right balance (e.g. harmony-disharmony, accomodation-alienation, vague-forthcoming) as not to be too obvious and (a) not being 'found out' & thus alienated, and paradoxically (b) enhancing the annoyance factor. Anyway, it's interesting stuff. A fascinating case study exists right here on this very forum.

I'm a bit dubious about such appreciation for the qualities of "a good troll" but I think your summary is pretty good nevertheless.
 
The trait of the troll is a unique and insatiable desire to annoy people, really to be a nuisance. It's what I would refer to as a mild form a schadenfreude. In many ways it is a regression to the adolescent self. A good troll is capable of striking the right balance (e.g. harmony-disharmony, accomodation-alienation, vague-forthcoming) as not to be too obvious and (a) not being 'found out' & thus alienated, and paradoxically (b) enhancing the annoyance factor. Anyway, it's interesting stuff. A fascinating case study exists right here on this very forum.
Who is here to annoy people or be a nuisance? Are you sure that you're not projecting?

Linda
 
We know about the details of various cognitive biases and how memory works, from empirical studies.
Do the empirical studies say anything at all with regard to estimates on the percentage of facts that humans actually do get correct, even with cognitive biases and faulty memory?

Cheers,
Bill
 
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